Effective talent retention starts with building trust.

All healthy relationships are built on a foundation of trust. Employment relationships are no different.

Looking beyond talent attraction, if you want to engage and retain the best people, you’ll need to make trust part of your work culture. When you get it right, you’ll lead a team of people who feel valued and are willing to go the extra mile for your organisation. 

So what is trust at work? How does it influence loyalty? And what can you do as an employer to make a trust a pillar of your leadership policy? Let’s find out. 

What is trust at work, and why does it matter?

Trust is at the heart of the employee experience you offer.

Trust at work is led by respect. By trusting your team, you establish a collaborative environment in which all team members feel valued, supported and included. This creates an organisational culture of psychological safety. It can help you optimise productivity while promoting development and resolving interpersonal conflicts.

A trusting workplace is a healthy, happy workplace where innovation is made possible. In the words of Netflix CEO and co-founder Reed Hastings, “It’s risky trusting employees as much as we do. Giving them as much freedom as we do. But it’s essential in creative companies where you have a much greater risk from lack of innovation.”

At Heart, we see the impact of trust firsthand. Only with healthy, trusting professional relationships is it possible to truly understand your organisation and your employer brand. 

Trust precedes transparency, which is critical if you want to conduct effective employee experience research and gain insights that help you enhance your offer.

The link between trust and loyalty

According to Edelman research, approximately 78% of employees trust their employer. But 79% also say that they trust their colleagues more.

We think it’s time for employers to start earning more trust from their teams.

This starts with employers thinking of their people as consumers, understanding the impact of trust on (employer) brand loyalty. 

In 2023, an Australian consumer loyalty survey by McKinsey revealed that retail loyalty programs were an integral part of inspiring trust and building communities that kept consumers engaged with a brand for the long-term.

People who are loyal and engaged with your (employer) brand long-term? That’s the dream!

Employers can learn from this consumer loyalty research.

You need systems in place that show people your trust in them and highlight why they should offer their trust in return. 

If you play your cards right, you can build an engaged and trust-driven community where relationships drive success at work.

What you can do as an employer

As an employer, there are plenty of steps you can take to enhance trust in support of your talent retention strategy. 

Often, trust starts with freedom. You can demonstrate trust by allowing your employees to work in a way that makes them more productive. In a modern job market, this may include remote or hybrid working environments and flexible hours as needed. 

You need to provide your team with an environment that helps them to thrive. Never forget that this will look different for different people. 

Trust your employees enough to welcome their original ideas and unique perspectives. Listen to their voices, and consider what they have to say. 

Trust your employees to take control of their own working lives while still doing their best for the benefit of your organisation. 

Trust your employees so that they can begin to trust you. As you build positive working relationships, you’ll do more than just retain your best people. You’ll also create brand ambassadors who will help you highlight the strength of your employer brand!

An example of ultimate trust

This example pre-dates the pandemic and has nothing to do with flexible or remote working. It’s much bigger than that.

Leading the way in building trust, one global business created the ultimate trust and community-driven leave policy, which became a cornerstone of their EVP and a positive employee experience.

In most businesses, employees accrue leave over time, building up their balance based on the work they do.

Here, leave works differently. Leading with trust in employees who will respect the system, this global employee gives their people their entire leave balance from day one. 

Leave is a promise, not something that people have to earn over time.

The result? A team of motivated employees who know that their employer trusts their work ethic and therefore have a reason to offer that trust in return.  

Wrapping up

Are you still feeling unsure of how to retain great talent in a competitive market? You’re not alone. 

For more insights, visit the Heart Talent blog. If you’d like hands-on support with your talent strategy, contact the Heart team today.